Small SOG - questions, help!

[jamstigator]

Okay, here's a pic of a SOG experiment. I normally use ScroG, but thought I'd play around some with a sea of green, see how it went. There are 24 plants in there (in a 46"x20" space, 3.75 plants per square foot). The strain is Nirvana AK-48 and it's on day 31 of flowering in this pic. They are in 24 separate 1/2-gallon square pots.

Question: is this normal? Look how freakin' big they are! I pulled out a ruler and measured last night, and they are about 33" tall, not counting the pot, about 38" tall with the pots - a bit over three feet.

Did I do something wrong? Is there something I should have done but didn't, or something I shouldn't have done but did? I didn't ever in my wildest imaginings expect them to get so huge in such tiny pots, all compressed into this limited space. It's not been a problem - they're quite healthy! Watering is a bit of a pain, but tolerable. Just curious if this is what a 'normal' SOG grow is like?

jamstigator Reviewed by jamstigator on 08-24-2007. Small SOG - questions, help! Okay, here's a pic of a SOG experiment. I normally use ScroG, but thought I'd play around some with a sea of green, see how it went. There are 24 plants in there (in a 46"x20" space, 3.75 plants per square foot). The strain is Nirvana AK-48 and it's on day 31 of flowering in this pic. They are in 24 separate 1/2-gallon square pots. Question: is this normal? Look how freakin' big they are! I pulled out a ruler and measured last night, and they are about 33" tall, not counting the pot, about Rating: 5

[cture]

Jam, you are supposed to have at least 32PARwatts per ftsq.

This will prevent excessive stretching of internodes as all plants will be provided with sufficient light energy so plants will develop buds rather than growig tall.

hps light has 30%PAR efficency, so 1 sq ft must be lighted by 97watts hps. For best results you must goal for 42 PAR watts per sqft which is 126watts of hps light per sqft.

Your plants got streched because that light in the cupboard is insufficient for that qantity of plants, if you don't wish to improve lighting then you should consider growing 3-5 plants.

[jamstigator]

Lol, waaaay too much trouble. And 800 watts for 7 square feet would seem like overkill; that'd be 112 watts per square foot, or 16,000 lumens per square foot. These were started from clones, so I don't see why new clones of these clones would make any difference. I started the clones flowering 2 days after taking them out of the EZ-Cloner. Was the mistake that I let them expand their roots for those two days instead of flowering immediately? They were all 3" or 4" tall, at most, when I began flowering.

At this point, they're less than 4 weeks from being done, and I'm guessing they'll give me six-ish ounces of buds for smoking, plus some leaves and popcorn buds for cooking. I'd rather have that than nothing!

The question is, since these were all clones, and I flowered very quickly after taking them out of the cloning machine and putting them into pots, *why* did they get so big? I may try this SOG experiment again, with some NYC Diesel clones, but I think I'll probably just go back to ScroG -- easier to water/feed 2 or 3 plants than it is 24. Safer too, legal-wise.

I have six more of these clones in a 4'x4' box with a 1k light. They do have more room there, and they are more budded up because of that, but they're also quite large, not much different than these 24. And that's with those 6 clones sitting right under a 1k light. So, it's not the light levels being inadequate making them get so big, it's something else.

Could be that AK-48, or the phenotype I have of AK-48, is just not ideal for SOG-style grows.

[xxxhazexxx]

1-2 ounces per plant, with 100 plants per square meter? So, about 8 or 9 pounds per square meter? I'd like to see some pics of *that*!

go look at my pics in my threads (rhinos for lip and slick d ) and theres many more

[xxxhazexxx]

they are to tall for sea sog you are supposed to flower clones from when they root 4-6" tall then you wind up with 1-2 zs per clone 100 clones per sqm

[HARDDON]

About to complete their 5th week in flower and still no large flowers yet?????

At this point you should have you flower buds well established and they should be everywhere.

Anyhow, if you SOG it, you want a 3 week veg period. Even shorter if you used clones.

Looks to me like you vegged too long...and...looks like they are still in veg. I just don't see the flowers. Maybe its the pic...but I would be looking for established flowers at this point.

To cut down on the growth, I would switch to 14/10 flower cycle.

Nice setup though!

[turtle420]

Glad the funnel idea helped.
They say necessity is the mother of invention.
We growers are unstoppable.

RE: SoG... it looks like a solid forrest.
You should get some action figures and do some battle scenes in there.
Post some pics up of the battle in JamS' Chewbacca World. :p

I'm with you... I think SoG is "clones with roots" --> 12/12
But still! Learning experiences are always good.
Thanks for the updates JamS.
Glad to know it's going well.

[jamstigator]

Thanks for the funnel idea, Turtle! I kept looking for one single unit that would accomplish that, but hadn't found anything. It didn't occur to me to connect several different units together to make what I need. I often see the trees, and miss the forest.

I do not rotate the plants. While that's a good idea, and I would like to, it doesn't look feasible - the plants' side branches are all intertwined in each other, and I'd probably damage them pulling them out and moving them around. Plus, I think they're all kinda relying on each other for support, so if I pulled 3 or 4 out, the whole thing might collapse on itself. Lol!

Oh, and they are in flowering, day 34 today. I'm not gonna sweat the yield; it'll be what it'll be. This was just a learning experiment. Whatever I pull out of there, I'll be happy with that. At least now I know why they bushed all out, and I know what I need to do if I do another SOG grow. Which I might, because it's really nice to basically skip the entire veg process and go straight from clones to flowering.

[turtle420]

Some thoughts...

1st-- COOL SoG!!

2nd-- Watering... just two cents:::
When I watered my mothers, they where inside a narrow, long cabinet.
So what I did, was I got my self (1) a pitcher, a (2) funnel, and a (3) piece of tubing.
Just plug the tubing (1.5-2 feet) into the funnel... and you place the end at the pot (base of the plant maybe?), and just pour away into into the funnel with the pitcher. Hope that helps.

3rd-- Out of curiosity... do you ever rotate your plants? Like, move the ones on the edges to the inside? Just wondering... to get a more complete picture of your grow.

4th-- PS: cture::: Damn man. Cool math on post #5.
Would you happen to have some links with information?
Or maybe you could write up something?
How much does a 600W HPS put out?

Nice grow JamS!
I'm with SmokinBuds21... I say you flower.

Best Wishes,

-turtle420
.

[jamstigator]

Aha! Yeah, Tranoble's da man!

Tranoble: "I strip the bottom 7-8 branches off at 10 days into Bud. They are so close together that the bottom stuff doesn't get much light. It's also easier to water."

That was what I should have done, but didn't. That surely explains the dense jungle I have, and my difficulty watering (especially the back ones). Welp, now I know why it didn't go quite as planned. Thanks, Pharm!

But yeah, I'm not just chucking it; that'd seem mighty wasteful. I'm sure there'll be plenty of smokable stuff there when it's done. Waste not, want not!